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About Carnevil

We've officially launched the site for this. Probably what's most notable about this is that we're opening our Trello up to the public. This means that anyone can follow along with the project and see what we're up to, how things are progressing, what's coming down the pipes, etc. Full write-up of all the new stuff here.

Ah, well thank you very much!
It is indeed! In fact, it has even more in common with that than the font. Because it's in part a comic-themed game, the different combo ranks in MvC3 refer to comic characters (Fantastic! Incredible! Galactic!). Because Wrack is also influenced by comics, it references similar things with its kill chains on the left side (Amazing! Beastly! Marvelous!), but also references classic shooters with its kill combos on the right side (Ludicrous! Serious! Unreal!).

Alright, still working on the website redo a lot (please forgive any issues with it), but here's my little write up on the Kickstarter campaign, and what we're up to next:
http://www.wrackgame.com/the-future-of-wrack-starfall/
I certainly agree which is why we're getting out of the oldschool shooter business. Starfall is a tower defense FPS with rogue-like elements, which is something that hasn't been done before. It's unique and interesting and I think we're on to something here.

Ah, well thanks. I appreciate the support. Really there's nothing or nobody to blame here other than me. Reception to the page and the idea has been very positive, and the average pledge has been very high (>$45). Just didn't get enough eyeballs on it and hadn't laid enough of the groundwork early. Firing off a few press emails the day before (which was Easter) wasn't going to cut it.
I'll have more to say about the process and future in a day or two.
Well, those kind of go hand-in-hand.

It was indeed! :) It was finished and released in 2014. We just chose not to expand it afterwards for a multitude of reasons. But people got exactly what was promised to them and what they paid for. I know there are those who wish we'd return to the original Wrack, but like I said earlier, a change of direction was pretty necessary.

Hey, thanks for your support guys! It really means a lot (seriously).
We're definitely taking things in a different direction here, but frankly it's something that needed to happen. We're trying to retain a lot of what made Wrack great and unique (art style, kill streak/super shot type thing, character designs, etc.) while doing something unique and interesting with the gameplay side. Tower defense is something I've long enjoyed (going back to a lot of great invasion/TD Doom mods) and I think we're on to something great here. The concept is so important these days, and while this one isn't going to appeal to everyone, I think we've got a great one.

He was also interviewed about arena shooters as a whole for my podcast (shameless plug!). It was a great conversation and we got onto some Doom-y points - definitely one of my favorite episode thus far.

The aesthetics were quite nice. The weapons felt really good to use - maybe more powerful than they actually were! I think there was music, but just industrial stuff while waiting for the match to start. Don't know if it was playing during the match. There was a lot going on audio-wise (players talking, sounds, noise from the audience/casters, etc.).
I think it will have a strong multiplayer scene.

So, a bunch of us from the Doom community (me, ClonedPickle, Patience, TDF, Felicrux, Conflagrated, and Xaser) went to QuakeCon and got to check out the playable Doom multiplayer alpha. I think for the most part we were all encouraged by what we saw, and ended up having an in-depth discussion about what we saw - features, weapons, balance, how it felt... the whole nine yards! Anyway, here's our discussion:
http://gamedesignpodcast.finalbossentertainment.com/?p=94
YouTube version:

Wow, that's pretty bad. Shame on them for being so dishonest. To paraphrase Mark Twain, "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth puts its shoes on." I guess this is another example of that.
So anyway, disregard everything I said, all hail Valve, etc.

I think I can sum up the impact on developers with two images:
The first developer is someone with a short $1.99 game that's highly rated. They're seeing about 75% of people return their game. If the game was bad or had severe issues (to the point where it didn't work for 75% of people), you wouldn't have seen it be so highly rated and selling so well prior to refunds being introduced. It seems that people are already scamming the system.
Sure, Valve reserves the right to stop further refunds if they think you're abusing it, but as the second image points out... exactly what incentive does Valve have to stop that? If you buy a game and then get a refund, Valve doesn't lose a dime. They're not exactly incentivized to do anything about it (except maybe to stop developers from getting pissed off, to which my response is hahaha). Besides, they're a giant corporation with tons and tons of users. They can't possibly monitor everyone's activities. Implementing a ban or something is something they would almost certainly want a human involved with.
Anyway, I feel bad for the developers of smaller, shorter games. What sense does it make for these dolphins to get snared in the tuna net that is the refund policy? If you want to say their games are cheap and not worth it and the developers should be penalized anyway, the games are already priced incredibly cheaply - less than a few dollars in many cases.

We had a lot of episode 2 done. The maps were all fully playable, the mechanics were all finished, additional monsters scripted, etc. It was going to be a ton of work to do all the additional textures, bosses, monsters, weapons etc. though to finish up and there just wasn't enough demand for it. Wrack itself barely got an ounce of coverage, so episode 2 likely wasn't going to get any - no matter how cool it was. It's our job to give people what they want, and not enough people wanted what Wrack was envisioned as. So, we're trying something new. I think this idea has legs, too.